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Triplebyte Raises $10M from Initialized Capital, Marissa Mayer and Paul Graham

triplebyte.com

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Re: Triplebyte Raises $10M from Initialized Capital, Marissa Mayer and Paul Graham

#51

Post by euyyn »

xiphias wrote: post #20
Harj wrote: post #13

What was always most interesting to us about starting a recruiting company was seeing what would happen if you treated hiring as a data problem. Partly we've raised more funding for the same reason any startup does, so we can grow faster to get more customers = more revenue = more success, etc. But we're also driven by how the larger the scale we operate at, the faster we can run experiments to answer questions about…

Hi, I just went through the interview questions, they were fun (they said that I did exceptionally well, but nothing concrete, like percentage). I'm not looking for job, just though I try it out. What I was interested in is whether the questions get harder, if I answer well, but they seemed random. You could use logistic regression to estimate the level of an interviewer and adjust the questions to get to the same ac…

Yeah GRE does that. They just use your answers as some sort of dichotomic search: they start giving you harder (or easier) questions until you are answering correctly ~50% of them.

Re: Triplebyte Raises $10M from Initialized Capital, Marissa Mayer and Paul Graham

#53

Post by tsme1 »

Harj wrote: post #13

What was always most interesting to us about starting a recruiting company was seeing what would happen if you treated hiring as a data problem. Partly we've raised more funding for the same reason any startup does, so we can grow faster to get more customers = more revenue = more success, etc. But we're also driven by how the larger the scale we operate at, the faster we can run experiments to answer questions about…

Where will you expand next? Which cities?/countries?

Re: Triplebyte Raises $10M from Initialized Capital, Marissa Mayer and Paul Graham

#54

Post by teirce »

zitterbewegung wrote: post #4

Anyone care to comment on how the whole Triplebyte process goes as a person who wants to be hired? I'm interested since I never got past the set of questions due to some kind of bug in the beta.

I passed the quiz and moved on to the phone interview.

Overall I don't think it was a good experience for me.

The interview was pleasant but long. Since they are more of a recruiting firm than anything, they are able to ask questions in a way that an organization looking to hire won't. It allows the candidate to be more candid and detailed with their knowledge and expectations. I thought it went well enough but I did not proceed to the company matching phase.

It is _very_ clear that they are looking for a specific type of developer - a type which I reckon probably doesn't need Triplybyte in the first place. I am not a web/rails/whatever developer, nor am I a senior engineer with very niche skillsets like low-level systems, etc.

The feedback I got was mostly positive, but contradicted itself in odd ways (pro: "we like your DB skills" / con: "work more with DBs") and really just translated to "you aren't marketable to startups and don't have the pedigree / experience needed to throw at our larger clients."

I suppose if you have an popular or incredibly niche skillset that is in-demand, but are having trouble getting the attention of companies for whatever reason (it happens), TripleByte is a decent shot. But if you have more general experience / a skill-set that

Ultimately they are a business and they have to operate this way, so I understand being turned down. I was, however, disappointed that I was 'let down' in a way by the vision I was pitched of what TripleByte claims to do / be.

Re: Triplebyte Raises $10M from Initialized Capital, Marissa Mayer and Paul Graham

#55

Post by bitL »

dsacco wrote: post #40
bitL wrote: post #25

I'll bite: Isn't using scientific methods in HR similar to stock trading? I.e. you need to predict how well a given person would fit within a company; you can't really capture significant soft abilities like who-knows-whom, which might have significantly bigger impact on profitability of the project than any individual/technical contribution if you purely optimize for profit. You also need to take into account compan…

> I'll bite: Isn't using scientific methods in HR similar to stock trading? As it happens, stock trading is a bad example of something scientific methods do not improve :)

Alright :) But it won't help you detecting emerging trends until it's late already, and in hiring you likely cut away people like Steve Jobs if you measure them scientifically. But if your goal is predictability, hiring replaceable corporate drones, then maybe...

Re: Triplebyte Raises $10M from Initialized Capital, Marissa Mayer and Paul Graham

#56

Post by bhuga »

I had a great experience with Triplebyte as a candidate (now hired employee), but I'd love to see them expand to other categories. Remote-friendly companies is a big one, but even more important is different skill levels. Right now triplebyte is oriented around finding the best, instead of finding everyone and helping employers get a candidate whose career path matches their needs.

Their process is fantastic. I can see them replacing first round interviews entirely at some companies if they can look for all the candidates companies need, not just the most senior.

I'm glad to hear they're expanding.

Re: Triplebyte Raises $10M from Initialized Capital, Marissa Mayer and Paul Graham

#57

Post by yoloswagins »

listic wrote: post #45
haaen wrote: post #33

For anyone who thinks that Paul Graham is still a YC partner: he has retired from Y Combinator. https://www.ycombinator.com/people/

What is he doing now? I can't find any information.

He's raising a child, from what I've heard.

Re: Triplebyte Raises $10M from Initialized Capital, Marissa Mayer and Paul Graham

#58

Post by dnautics »

yetanotherthro8 wrote: post #39
zitterbewegung wrote: post #4

Anyone care to comment on how the whole Triplebyte process goes as a person who wants to be hired? I'm interested since I never got past the set of questions due to some kind of bug in the beta.

I'll answer, made a throwaway because I don't want to be identified. I did the quiz, moved straight to remote Triplebyte interview. Then to on-sites with 3-4 companies. Got along great with everyone, rocked many of the algorithm and system design questions (and some not). Got zero offers. I am a swe with 2-3 years of experience, maybe four depending on how you count experience maybe, speak at lots of large conference…

I had a similar experience, but, having interviewed with several companies outside of triplebyte I'm not too upset about it. The old hay about companies "looking for someone with 10 years experience in Go" applies. In the end it seems like the only way I can get a job is the really old fashioned way (via friends network).

Re: Triplebyte Raises $10M from Initialized Capital, Marissa Mayer and Paul Graham

#59

Post by gwern »

Alex3917 wrote: post #19

> And we've now reached the point where our automated assessment substantially outperforms human interviewers at evaluating technical skill. What does this mean exactly? E.g. does the test successfully identify the people who have the best portfolios of things they’ve built previously?

It might mean something like the test predicts better than a randomly-selected interview whether a candidate will eventually be hired. The real question is whether the interview here is an unstructured interview or a structured interview. Industrial psychologists have been pointing out for decades that unstructured interviews are awful, even though everyone keeps doing them, so it wouldn't be surprising if they can be outperformed by even a simple checklist or test. (There are similar, somewhat infamous, results for things like judges and parole - where simple linear models can outpredict the experts.)
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